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Love, Loss, Nostalgia, and Regret: American Modernists

Explore the lives of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway, their works reflecting themes of nostalgia, regret, and loss, unveiling the depths of human emotion in the American Modernist era.

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Love, Loss, Nostalgia, and Regret: American Modernists

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  1. Love, Loss, Nostalgia, and Regret: American Modernists HUM 2213: British and American Literature II Spring 2015 Dr. Perdigao February 18-20, 2015

  2. F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) • Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald born September 24, 1896, in St. Paul, Minnesota • Family moved to Buffalo, NY, in 1898 after furniture business fails; father was a salesman with Proctor & Gamble; moved to Syracuse, NY in 1901, back to Buffalo in 1903 • Family moved back to St. Paul in 1908, F. Scott Fitzgerald enrolled in St. Paul Academy; first story published in school journal • Enrolled in Newman School in Hackensack in 1911, wrote and produced four plays and three stories • Attended Princeton University in 1913; became involved in literary and dramatic activities; published stories, plays, and poems • Left Princeton citing illness but actually poor grades, returned in 1916 • Joined army as second lieutenant in 1917, reported to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; started work on novel

  3. F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) • Transferred to Kentucky in 1918; sent off manuscript to Charles Scribner’s Sons, publishers; stationed in Georgia, Alabama; met Zelda Sayre; Scribners rejected novel; revised; rejected again; sent to NY awaiting overseas duty but war ended • Engaged to Zelda in 1919; worked at advertising agency; she broke the engagement due to his “uncertain” future; he moved to St. Paul; This Side of Paradise accepted by Scribners; magazine stories accepted • 1920: Engaged again; married; lived in CT; published This Side of Paradise and first short story collection; moved to NYC • Fitzgeralds travel to England, France, Italy in 1921; returned to St. Paul; daughter Frances Scott (Scottie) was born • The Beautiful and the Damned and Tales of the Jazz Age published in 1922; moved to Long Island • 1924: traveled to France; Zelda’s affair; traveled to Italy • The Great Gatsby published in 1925; rented Paris apartment; met Hemingway

  4. F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) • Moved to Hollywood to write a screenplay for flapper film “Lipstick” in 1927; never produced • Back to Europe: Paris, Italy, Riviera in 1928-1929 • Zelda suffered a nervous breakdown in 1930; Fitzgerald sent her to Malmaison Clinic, Valmont Clinic in Switzerland, Swiss clinic Prangins; Fitzgerald stayed in Switzerland • Returned to the US for father’s funeral in 1931; family moved back to Montgomery; worked on screenplay for Jean Harlow • 1932: Zelda’s health deteriorated; she was admitted to the Phipps Clinic at Johns Hopkins • 1933-4: Completed Tender is the Night; published; Zelda’s breakdown • Fitzgerald became ill in 1935

  5. F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) • 1936: Zelda hospitalized; mother died • 1937: Six-month contract from MGM • 1939: Fired from new film due to drinking; worked as freelance scriptwriter; started new novel about Hollywood • Zelda released from hospital; Fitzgerald died of heart attack on December 21, 1940; buried in Maryland • Zelda reentered hospital in 1947, died in fire on March 10, 1948 • 1975: F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda reburied in Maryland; 1986 daughter Scottie buried with them

  6. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) • Born July 21, 1899 in Oak Park, Illinois; spent youth in Michigan, summers at cabin with family • Newspaper reporter for Kansas City Star, developed a journalistic style • Experience in World War I: wanted to enlist but his father forbade it, suffered from poor eyesight; volunteered as ambulance driver for the American Red Cross, ambulance unit in Italy, 1918; Austrian mortar shells hit, shrapnel in Hemingway’s leg, shot by machine gun bullets, recovery in Milan • Started writing short stories when home, rather than “get a job” or go to college (at parents’ urging), submitted stories to Saturday Evening Post, got work at Toronto Star • Married Hadley Richardson, moved to Paris in the twenties; met Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Dos Passos • 1925 collection In Our Time, followed by The Sun Also Rises (1926)

  7. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) • Married Pauline Pfeiffer; while she was pregnant, wrote A Farewell to Arms in Paris, but was forced to return to the US in 1928; moved to Key West (lived there for 12 years), wrote final draft there; learned of father’s death in the same year—result of suicide caused by failing health (diabetes, angina, headaches) and failed real estate endeavor in Florida • Spent time between falls in Wyoming, winters in Key West, summers in France and Spain • 1932—published book about bullfighting Death in the Afternoon • In a 1933 short story collection, “After the Storm” focuses on Spanish passenger liner lost at sea • During Depression, in 1931, bought Key West house at 907 Whitehead Street with money from film rights to A Farewell to Arms, went on African safari, bought boat for deep-sea fishing upon return in Keys

  8. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) • Depression-era life worked into two stories, become part of To Have and Have Not (1937), only novel set in the United States, in Key West • 1935 Green Hills of Africa, nonfictional account of safari • 1937, traveled to Spain as correspondent during the Spanish Civil War, met Martha Gellhorn, supported Loyalists, as anti-fascists (not Communist sympathizer) • Separated from Pauline, away from Key West, lived in Cuba with Martha, then, because of tumultuous weather, sought respite in Idaho • For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940) • Split with Martha, met Mary Welsh, married in 1946, after war, received Bronze star for work as correspondent

  9. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) • Across the River is only publication between 1940-1950, bad reviews • Created stories about the sea that become Islands in the Stream, published in 1970 • Story about Cuba leads to The Old Man and the Sea, finished in 6 weeks, written in 1951, published in 1953; mother died, publisher Charles Scribner died, ex-wife Pauline died after quarrel • Appeared in Life magazine, more than 6 million copies sold overnight • Safari with Mary after publication, after Spanish bullfights, two plane crashes, Hemingways reported dead, read own obituaries • 1953 awarded Pulitzer Prize • Returned home to Cuba in 1954, wrote new account of safari, learned he won the Nobel Prize • Film Old Man and the Sea released 1958, between 1957-8, work on A Moveable Feast (published posthumously), about Paris, nostalgia and regret

  10. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1940) • When away in Idaho, revolution in Cuba occurred, fear of losing all possessions, bought home in Idaho • Traveled to Spain, wrote story about competing matadors • Began to show signs of mental illness; could not cut down manuscript, later published as The Dangerous Summer • Returned to Cuba for the last time in 1960 • Mary went to NY, Ernest to Spain; showed signs of memory loss, paranoia, insomnia, depression, sent to NY, developed paranoia about FBI following him, was hospitalized—diagnosed with diabetes, cirrhosis, depression, resulting in electroshock therapy • Could not write, tried to reorder A Moveable Feast

  11. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) • Mary found him with shotgun, had him readmitted to the Mayo clinic; on the way to the clinic, he tried to walk into propellers of plane; underwent more shock treatments and was again released • After two nights home, went to basement, Sunday, July 2, 1961, got gun, shot himself in foyer

  12. Nella Larsen (1891-1964) • Born in Chicago as Nellie Walker; daughter of white Danish mother Marie Hanson and black West Indian father Peter Walker • Father died when Larsen was young; mother remarried Scandinavian Peter Larsen • Larsen claimed to have lived in Denmark, returned to attend University of Copenhagen, but scholars have not found support • Studied at Fisk University, studying nursing (1907-1908), then Lincoln Hospital School of Nursing in NYC (1912-1915); worked for Tuskegee Institute’s Andrew Memorial Hospital as head nurse, then NYC’s Board of Health • 1919—married research physicist Dr. Elmer S. Imes; went from working class to African American middle class • Employed at 135th Street branch of NY Public Library; met writers in Harlem; entered Library School of the NY Public Library in 1922

  13. Nella Larsen (1891-1964) • Carl Van Vechten claimed to have discovered her, introduced her to Knopf publishers • Walter White, former director of NAACP, had encouraged Larsen to complete Quicksand • Van Vechten introduced novel to his publisher; W. E. B. Du Bois praised the novel • Quicksand (1928): Helga Crane, daughter of white mother and black father; teacher at Naxos; travels to Denmark; considered exotic; returns to America; questions of race in America, abroad: South: Chicago: Harlem: Copenhagen: NYC: South; desire for control over her body and identity—resulting in quicksand, loss of autonomy and agency • Passing (1929): Irene Redfield, Clare Kendry; passing in America; racial identity; psychological doubles; themes of racial passing, class and social mobility, and female desire

  14. Nella Larsen (1891-1964) • Harmon Foundation’s bronze medal for achievement in literature • Guggenheim Fellowship in creative writing (1930) • Wrote in Spain and France • Divorce in 1933 • Failure to publish third novel • Loss of status in return to nursing • Stopped writing in the late 1930s • Charges of plagiarism for story “Sanctuary” (1930); Sheila Kaye-Smith’s story “Mrs. Adis” published in 1922 • Lost connections to other New York writers; former husband died in 1941; worked as nurse in NYC hospitals until death in 1964

  15. Race, Gender, and Sexuality • Recovery of her work in 1970s • Contemporary critics questioning endings of stories: sacrifice of independent female identities • Marriage and death as themes • Conflicting ideas about racial and sexual identities, a black and feminine aesthetic • Ideology of romance—marriage and motherhood • Repressed female sexual experience • Ideas about black female sexuality—insisting on chastity like the purity of Victorian bourgeoisie (McDowell xiii)

  16. Redefining Race, Gender, and Sexuality • How does one identify him/herself and why? What happens when academics, philosophers, and sociologists change the terms on you? • What does it mean to be black, middle class, and a woman? • Ideology: Social constructions that can confine groups; system of beliefs established and becomes part of “cultural norm” • Race, class, and gender are constructs; we created race through language (real but manmade) • Carole Vance writes, “Sexuality is simultaneously a domain of restriction, repression, and danger as well as a domain of exploration, pleasure, and agency” (qtd. in McDowell xiv). • Ideas of pleasure and danger in both texts • 19th century ideas about sexuality but flirtation with “female sexual desire” connects them to the liberation of the 1920s (McDowell xiv).

  17. Emancipation Acts • Passing as “a device for encoding the complexities of human personality, for veiling women’s homoerotic desires, and for subverting simplistic notions of female self-actualization” (Thadious M. Davis 253) • Female sexuality—ideas about domestic sphere in relation to a “woman’s quest for satisfaction and completion” (Davis 253). • Passing ends with “irreparable breakdown of illusions about emancipatory strategies or possible futures for women” (Davis 253).

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